Too Much of a Good Thing
by GoddessofSnark
Summary: How many glasses of scotch had it been? Far too many. It was meant to be just one glass, but feeling numb was so good. He wanted to forget about her, and his job.
1. Chapter 1

A/N a plot bunny that took hold and wouldn't let go. I love a drunk Garret, he's just so much fun to write. Thanks to garretelliot for being a beta! Don't own em, but if I did there would be a lot more alcohol on that show, and it would have to be moved to HBO.

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I downed another tumbler of scotch. When I started, I hadn't had this idea in mind. It was supposed to be just a glass to take the edge off the pain. A glass became "who cares, I don't have to get up in the morning." and now it's this, whatever this is. Me pushing the limits of how much I can take, trying to completely drown out everything. Work. Jordan. Work. Everything.

This was what, my seventh? Eighth? No, it had to be higher, the bottle was full when I started. That was the only thing I had ventured out for today. I didn't want to face the world. So I had slipped out only to go down the street to the liquor store for a bottle of Johnnie Walker. As such I had only thrown on a pair of jeans, not caring about the way I looked, jeans and a wrinkled undershirt with my jacket thrown carelessly on top.

Things had come to a new low. I had hit rock bottom and started digging. No job. She was obviously in love with Woody. I had nothing left. The faint glimmer of hope that maybe things would turn out alright was gone. Before, when one thing went wrong I at least had the other to turn to. If things were going bad at work, I had the faint hope of having her to entertain me, pull me through. If she was seeing someone, in love, I had work to throw myself into.

And the last I heard she had Woody. And I had no one. I had my own lonely heart. I had screwed over every relationship I'd had. I had lost Maggie twice, Rene and I had gone sour, we had fought for that relationship with everything, and it wasn't enough, she hadn't wanted it, she had wanted a relationship, but she didn't want the work involved. And everyone in between and since as just someone, another woman, just someone to prove that I was still a man.

Lilly hadn't counted. It had taken Jordan pointing out that Lilly was drooling over me for me to notice her. I liked her, Lilly was a close friend, but the only reason that I had even asked her out was because Jordan all but shoved me into it. If it wasn't for that, I would have never cared. And I got saved from it by Maggie.

And then Maggie and I had gone sour. We were a match made in hell, the two of us. I loved her, and she loved me, but we just didn't get along. We'd snipe at each other, and I knew that she was screwing around with half the men in the world, but I kept wanting to make it work. I kept trying to work through it. Twice. I'm one of those men that has a sign on me that says "walk all over me."

I tried the same thing with Rene, trying to make it work, trying to get us to be together. She kept wanting to fight it, saying that we wouldn't work, and I kept wanting us to work. I kept trying to work through everything, and we didn't. She left and went back to Eddy, and I was left sitting in my office watching as she walked away carrying another man's child.

And now I didn't even have the faint glimmer of hope of Jordan. The minute I saw her I had only thought of doing the same thing to Maggie that she did to me-find some pretty little thing and prove to her that she wasn't the only one that could screw around. But after I got to know her, she became much more in my mind than someone that I could use for only revenge. She was special.

I had never believed in love at first sight. I had always written it off as a foolish notion created by those foolish enough to be fooled by love. I downed another tumbler of scotch at that though. Nine, I thought. I couldn't move, I knew that much, I tried to move and the world started spinning. It was alright though, I didn't need to move, I would just sit here, firmly planted on my couch, music playing in the background.

I heard the phone ring and I ignored it. There was no way I was going to get up and get it. I moved too much and I felt a roll of nausea hit me. The answering machine clicked on. "Garret? Garret I know you're there, pick up the phone." It was her, it was Jordan, calling me for some reason that I didn't know. "Garret, c'mon, pick up the phone. Talk to me." She sounded desperate for company, and I tried to stagger upwards finishing off tumbler number ten.

I reached the phone and picked it up, but she had already hung up. I cursed myself and headed back to the couch, falling into it as I tripped over the table that held the bottle and glass, trying to remember what I was thinking about before. Something about love. Love at first sight. That's what I was thinking about.

I hadn't believed in it before, not until I had met her, gotten to know her. I had known her barely a week when I knew that I was a hopeless cause. And I kept my mouth shut about it, I hadn't wanted a divorce, and I loved her too much to have her just for a fling, if I had her for a fling I would have wanted her for life.

I downed another gulp, completely ignoring the glass this time. One glass had progressed to the better part of a bottle. It was a good thing I had bought the red label and not the blue. Charlie Parker was keeping me good company with Johnnie Walker. We were a trio made in heaven the three of us.

She had probably given up. She was probably just calling to check up on me. Maybe see if I wanted to go out and get drunk. Well, I had accomplished the second part pretty well. Very well. Another swig disappeared and I frowned in the realization that the bottle was almost gone. Shame too.

It was much more than drunk. I knew I was pushing the limits of what my body could take. But it felt so good, being so numb about everything. It's funny, of all people a doctor should have the sense to know too much of a good thing. But too much of a good thing felt so good. It took my mind away from her and how I would never have her. It took my mind away from my nonexistent job.

And if there was a way to go, it was definitely too much of a good thing. I never was afraid of death, and the only thing I think I'd regret is all the stuff I've never done, like seeing every island in the Caribbean. Or skydiving. Or having her. But I've never been afraid of death, only of what I'd leave behind. There is a certain amount of danger in my job, especially when I'd go out on my own little hunch with no one else around, risking my own life. It never scared me.

I heard her pound on the door and I fought for something to say, but couldn't think of anything. "Garret, I know you're here, now open up." I staggered back to my feet and took about three steps towards the door before falling over. I felt blackness creeping in as she threatened to let herself in if I didn't open the door. Let her, she had the key. I heard her murmur a faint "Oh my god.", as she walked in before the blackness fully enveloped around me.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N this was supposed to be sorta a one shot that grew to a two-shot, that may or may not grow to a chatpered fic-I still don't know, but if y'all can suggest someplace for it to go, I'll be more than willing to write it. Thanks again to garretelliot for beta'ing.

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I awoke to a throbbing pain rocketing through my entire body and I groaned, fighting to keep down whatever was in my stomach. I opened my eyes to find the bright flourescent light above me to be just that-too bright. I slowly took stock of everything and fought to remember what happened.

I still had both legs. Still had both arms. And everything in between. All my fingers, all my toes. At the moment the pain seemed to be evenly distributed throughout my entire body but centered most in my head. Once I was sure that all my injures were not due to being beaten to within an inch of my life I tried to remember what had happened.

A bottle of Johnnie Walker. That's what I remembered. Charlie Parker playing in the background. Trying to forget about work and Jordan. Jordan. Had I really seen her next to me? Where was I? I opened my eyes just a slit and saw the familiar dry white ceiling and sterile walls of a hospital. The faint drip in my arm confirmed that I was indeed on a hospital bed with an IV dripping into me. I turned my head and found that she was indeed sitting there.

She noticed that I was awake and I could see her open her mouth to chew me out and then decided against it. "What the hell did you do to yourself?" She asked me and I shrugged. "Were you trying to drink yourself to death?"

I wouldn't admit that I wouldn't have cared if I did. It hadn't been the outcome I was aiming for, but if it happened, it happened. But it obviously hadn't. I was alive, however just barely. "You don't pick up your phone, I go to your place and I walk in to find you passed out on the floor barely breathing cold as ice. I thought you were-" She trailed off and I could see fear in her eyes.

That was something I certainly hadn't wanted. I never wanted to hurt her, or scare her. "You almost died." She said, and I frowned. This was worse than her screaming at me, the look of utter fear on her face. This look that said that I had scared her almost to death. That I had almost left her. "I almost lost you." She said, and I could see the tears in her eyes, and I lifted a shaky hand to wipe one away.

"I'm fine." I croaked and she smiled faintly.

"You started seizing in the ambulance. I thought you were gone."

"I'm fine." I told her again, gripping her hand tightly with my own. I wasn't going to leave her. She was the only one that I would regret leaving. Nigel and Bug and Lily, yes, thinking about leaving them and the way they would react was sad, but seeing her here with fear in her eyes, relief etched on her face when she realized that I was alright, that made me realize just how much she meant to me.

"You're the only thing that's left Gar, Woody doesn't want me anymore, you're the last one left I can turn to." Hearing her say that immediately made me regret everything that I had just done. Hearing her telling me that I was the one person left that matters in her life was something that made me regret even considering leaving her, not caring if I did.

I smiled up at her as the nurse walked in to check on me. "You're a very lucky man." The nurse chided me. "Your BAC is at .3. You as a doctor knows that borders on coma and death." I nodded, properly scolded. "If you didn't have such a wonderful woman right here you'd be dead right now. We're honestly surprised you're up. And coherent." I shrugged. "You are going to be here for the next 24 hours no ifs ands or buts. Just be glad you're here and not the place you should be with your friends having to cut you open to find out you were stupid enough to pickle yourself to death."

The nurse checked the various monitors I was on before walking back out and I stared down at the sheet, knowing full well that the short woman had been right. I turned to Jordan where she had a look of "I told you so" on her face. "I'm sorry." I told her and she grinned, more out of relief than anything. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"It's alright." She said and I smiled back at her. "But whatever possessed you to drink that much?" She asked and I debated on whether or not to tell her. Should I tell her that part of the reason had been her, trying to drink away the thought of her and the knowledge that she loved Woody.

But hadn't she just said that Woody had pushed her away? This was my chance, my little opening to slide into her life as something more than her best friend. "Work." I said, choosing not to tell her. I didn't need her to feel guilty about something she had no control over. She was beautiful, the one I had fallen in love with, it wasn't a fault of hers that I had.

She could tell it was something else, though, something about the way I said it that sparked her natural curiosity, her ability to read me far too well. I could never play poker against her, I would loose every time. She could read me far too well. "Slokum's going to be gone soon enough, you know that and I know that." It was true, Rene had all but told me that they just had to go through the motions and that I would have my job back.

"Still." I argued and the look on her face told me that she wanted to know the real truth. The real truth was I had started thinking about her and didn't have work to throw myself into to distract myself.

"What is it Garret, really?"

"Love, and my failure at it." She quirked an eyebrow.

"I didn't realize you started seeing someone else to have it go bad."

"I'm not. That was the problem." It was a big problem. I wanted to be dating her, and instead here I was in a hospital bed because I tried to erase the thought of her from my memory.

"You'll find someone." She said and I shrugged.

"I already have, she just doesn't love me." Her eyebrows knitted together as she thought about what to do about my situation. It was true. I found the one for me, she was sitting right here, but she would never love me, not the way I wanted her to.

"You know this for a fact." I nodded.

"She's said it more than once, that I'm only a friend."

"Right. So you've actually tried asking her out?" She knew me far too well. I would never ask her out, if only because she had said that I'm her friend so many times.

"No, she's said that I'm her friend before, I didn't want to risk screwing everything up." She nodded.

"Maybe you should." Maybe I should, but I didn't want to, I didn't want to send her running. I had her now, wasn't that enough.

"No." I said simply and she glared at me.

"So you're going to drink yourself to death instead of take a chance? That's double cowardice." She said and I glared at her. I could do it, right then and there. All I would have to do is just ask, and see what she would do.

"It's not being cowardly, she has someone else." It was the truth. Sort of.

"You know this for a fact?" I nodded.

"Well, they kinda hit a rough point in their relationship." I could see the bit of a sympathetic look on her face, not realizing that the person she was feeling sympathetic towards was herself.

"So there's your chance to ask her. What's the worst she can say?"

"That I've screwed over our friendship as well." She thought about it for a long minute.

"Do you think she'll hate you for saying that you want to be more than friends?"

"Would you?" I asked, and she laughed, not realizing that the question was in fact not asking her if she would hate any man that tried it, but that the question was in fact doing what she had told me to do.

"I don't know, I mean, if I knew the guy, if it was Nigel, or Bug that asked, I'd still want to be their friend, but you can't deny the awkwardness that comes from it." I frowned.

"That settles it." I told her and she shook her head.

"No, it's always worth the risk. Is that something you want to regret having never done? Possibly letting the one love of your life slip away?"

She had a point, I wasn't going to let her just walk away and walk back to Woody, I couldn't, I loved her too much for that to happen. "No." I admitted and she grinned.

"See, there you go, as soon as you get out of here go up to her and flat out tell her that you care about her and want her. Who is it, anyone I know?" I shrugged.

This was it, this was my chance, could I do it? Would I do it? I had just nearly died, I could see how she was affected by my almost death, she cared about me, I was her best friend. Did she care enough? Did she care that way? "Yeah, you know them." I told her and she fought a grin.

"So go and ask them when you get out." Why wait? I might as well get it done. "Who is it?" She asked and I shrugged. Now or never. I needed a drink. Why couldn't she have come before I passed out, why couldn't I say all this drunk. Then we could both pretend that it was something I said when drunk and forget about it the next day.

"You." I told her simply, turning my head away, not wanting to see her reaction, not wanting to see what she would say. But after a minute I had to, I couldn't not look at her anymore, and I saw the look as if she had just been picked up and slammed down on the ground.

"Garret-" She started and I turned my head away again.

"Look, there was a reason I never said anything before." I told her and she placed a hand on my shoulder.

"Gar, just let me think about this." It wasn't a flat out no, at least. "I mean, I'm still on the rebound here." I smiled faintly. Did that mean I had a chance?

"Take your time." I told her and she smiled at me.

"It's just I've never expected this." She said. "I mean-"

"It's alright." I said, looking up at her.

"Just don't ever do anything that stupid ever again." She said, leaning in and kissing me softly. It felt like heaven. I had to still be out, I had to still be unconscious, this had to be a dream.

"I won't." I told her. If it meant having her, I'd give up the world. I'd give up every single thing I owned. And the smile on her face made it all worth it.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N I thank garretelliot for suggesting and beta'ing this chapter...it was her idea, I just put it to paper. And this is probably the end of it, if there's going to be more, it will be a single chapter, I have Follow Your Heart to work on!

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I sat there, floored by what he had told me. The doctor stopped in, made sure that he was still alive and was only asleep and left me alone after a disapproving glare. The doc hadn't wanted me there, claimed family only, but he had relented when he had seen just how desperate I was. Just how afraid.

I'd never been that afraid before in my life. Even when I found out that Woody was shot, it hadn't affected me like this. I think part of it was walking in and being the one to find him there, sprawled out, I hadn't seen his chest move at all, and he felt so cold. I really did think the worst. I thought he had had a heart attack, something, just keeled over and died until I heard a raspy breath and saw the almost empty bottle of scotch on the table.

Being there in the ambulance with him had been the most nerve wracking time of my life. Watching them wheel Woody into surgery had gotten me to confess something I never would have confessed before. And Woody had told me to screw my pity, and, well, it hadn't occurred to me at the time that was why I had said it, but looking back on it, it could have very well been why. Fear, and the thought that he may never be who he was ever again.

I thought I loved Woody, I thought that I really did love him, but the more I thought about it the more I wondered if it was true. I wondered if I really did love him or if it was something I had said out of pity. I loved him, but at the same time, I didn't. And what Garret had just said made things all the more complicated.

I loved Garret, but he was the one that was always there for me, he was my best friend, the one that I held onto because there was no one else left as a constant in my life. He was the one that was always there for me, always championing my cause, and I had never realized why until now. He had never mentioned it before, never gave me a single hint that he wanted more than friendship.

It must have been torture for him, all the times that I would run to him, where I would curl up against him and gripe about whatever it was that day. We were always so-physical. I just assumed that he was the same type of person a very tactile, touching type, but the more I thought about it, the more those touches seemed to be that of someone who loved me but was afraid to show it.

The thought of us together that way had never crossed my mind. When we met he had Maggie, he was married, with a wife and a daughter. And then I had left, and come back. And he didn't have Maggie. But I was so busy trying to get settled back in Boston that I didn't even want to think about anything romantic so I had pushed him towards Lilly, and then Maggie had come back.

And by the time he had finished with all that, Woody had entered the picture. And the caseload had grown huge. I didn't have a chance to think of anyone romantically. So life had gone on with the two of us being just friends. And then Rene stepped in, and Woody and I started flirting with something more than what we were, and now, well, now the truth had finally come out.

I looked at the man who sat there, sound asleep. I had kissed him, simply to see if I was missing something, and there was something there that I hadn't felt with Woody. I loved Woody, I never wanted to see him die, and it had taken him nearly dying for me to realize that, but now that I had almost lost Garret as well, I realized how much he meant to my life.

And he meant so much more than Woody, he had been there for longer, we had been through more together. He had been the one to save me from myself, he didn't even know me at the time. He had been the one to take me back, put up with me, I had been through so much with him, he was the one that was always there for me no matter what, he had stood by me through thick and thin, even defended me to Walcott when it put their relationship at risk.

And he loved me. But so did Woody. And I loved both of them…the question was which one did I love more? I loved Woody like a brother, I never wanted to loose him, but yet every time we flirted with more it felt so wrong. And now with Garret in the picture, the kiss we had had been electric, one of those that made every hair on my body stand up on end. I hadn't had a kiss like that in ages.

I had never thought of him that way though. At least I could count on him not to leave me, he seemed so sincerely upset that I was scared that he would leave me. As if the last thing he wanted to do is ever hurt me or scare me. Was that why he kept reserving judgment on Woody? He had said that Woody was a good guy, but he never said much about my relationship with the detective.

I never thought that he felt something more for me though, I never thought that his love for me was that way. I always thought that I was something of a little sister to him, someone that he loved, that he doted on, and I knew I got away with anything because of him, that if anyone else tried the stunts that I had pulled that he would have fired them on the spot, but he always never seemed to mind when I did things.

The only thing he had ever cared about was when I risked my life. And it was understandable. I always thought it was just because he loved me in a platonic just-friends kind of way, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that he really did love me that way. And that it maybe wasn't such a bad thing.

The more I thought about it, the more and more it seemed like a better idea. He had been there for me through so much. He had been there to help me through finding out most of the truth about my mother, he had been there for me every time I reached the breaking point, always ready to lend a hand or a shoulder to cry on.

He loved me, and he wasn't going to shove me away the way Woody had. We were already so in tune to each other. We could finish each other's sentences, banter on and on about everything and nothing, spend an entire night in silence and still know everything that the other one was going to say.

It wouldn't be that hard to go from that to love, would it? Real love, the stuff of bad romance novels and fairy tales. We already were almost there. He loved me, he had said as much. And he was one of those guys that didn't let a relationship die without a fight, he wanted to make every relationship he was in work, he wanted to not let a relationship just fizzle out, he didn't want to let a fight end things, he wanted to keep working through the problems.

The more that I thought about it, the more appealing a relationship with him seemed, the more I wanted it. Woody had shoved me away, he couldn't complain about it, he couldn't say that he still wanted me when he left me high and dry, if he still wanted me, it was his fault, right?

I tried to convince myself of that. Because with every passing moment Garret seemed more and more appealing. He wasn't a bad looking man, he was good looking in a very Bogart sort of way, dark and deep and mysterious with how had that black widow put it? Bogart eyes. Very Marlowe. Sexy in an unconventional way. He may not have had all of his hair, but some how bald looked good on him. I had seen a few pictures of him with hair and he looked much better without hair than with.

He started stirring awake and I smiled at him. Yes, I could get used to him, it wasn't such a big stretch from friendship to a relationship was it? "Hello sleeping ugly." I teased him and he smiled.

"What time is it and can I leave yet?" I looked up at the clock. Was it already that late?

"It's two, and you won't be able to leave until tomorrow morning."

"They said twenty four hours." he complained and I grinned.

"Right, you try catching a cab at one in the morning from the hospital and get back to me." He frowned and I fought off a laugh.

"So." I started, searching for a conversation topic.

"So." He repeated, an inquisitive look in his eyes.

"I've been thinking." He chuckled.

"Someone call the Globe." I slapped his arm once for that comment.

"About what you said." That seemed to wipe the grin right off of his face.

"Look, Jordan, just forget about it-" He started and I cut him off with a kiss. He stared at me incredulously.

"I thought maybe it's worth a shot." I told him and he looked a little shocked before a grin crossed his face. "I thought that I would loose you and it made me realize that you mean so much to me." I confessed truthfully.

"You really want to try this?" He asked me and I nodded.

"Why the hell not?" He grinned and I leaned over and kissed him once more, enjoying the feeling of his lips, of the scruff of his goatee against my face. Yes, it was something I might just get used to.


End file.
